Greek theologian: Revoking autocephaly of ROC is canonically unfounded

Patriarch Kirill and Patriarch Bartholomew. Photo: bbc.com

The Greek theologian, Dr Anastasios Vavouskos, believes that the threats to revoke the autocephalous status of the Russian Orthodox Church for a period of five years are canonically unfounded, the Greek resource “Romfea” reports.

Vavouskos stresses that " the granting of autocephalous status is done in perpetuity and not for a certain period of time", and " the granted autocephaly is not given under conditions, in particular under the condition that the new Church observes the limits of its normal jurisdiction".

The Greek theologian highlights that “these ‘conditions’ constitute the necessary conditions for the smooth operation of the new Church, and the smooth operation is an internal affair of every Church and is an integral part of its independence”.

“And only if the Church itself, recognizing the impossibility of its proper functioning, requests the intervention of the Mother Church, then it will intervene in accordance with the applicable normal provisions, in order to help rectify the malfunction,” Dr Anastasios Vavouskos writes.

“In this light, there is no room for the spontaneous intervention of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in the interior of the Moscow Patriarchate, especially when there are no such internal issues of dysfunction of the Russian Church,” the theologian concludes.

That is why the proposal to revoke the autocephalous status of the Moscow Patriarchate for a certain period, according to the theologian, “is not only devoid of normal validity but also leads to a violation of relevant canonical provisions”.

“Assuming again that such a decision is normally admissible, the first question that arises is the duration of the suspension of the autocephalous regime. Why be five years and not three or six?” Vavouskos asks.

As earlier reported, the Greek hierarch proposed to revoke the autocephalous status of the Russian Church for five years.

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